Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for April 06, 2019

Bears can run twice as fast as humans. You’ll just work up their appetite by running.

You don’t have to outrun the bear, you just have to outrun your friends.

Bear One, Pig Zero. Pig, you look more appetizing when you run.

I’m with Rat and Pig. Be nice to our friends in the wild.

Was not it said that you had to play dead? At least the bear would think you were stinking.

Just remember: you don’t have to outrun the bear, just Pig.

You have Rat kick the bear in its nether region, and punch it in the schnooz; then run like heck away from both Rat and the bear

When your heart says “you’re panicking” but your eyes say you’re not.

But what if they’re Wiley Bears?

No

Saying “Oh s—t, this is it” comes to mind.

Even worse in Australia, you need to watch out for drop bears!

Pork Helper helped Pig’s pork help Bear make a great meal.

ok, so you know those strips in the treasuries where Steph comments with something like “Yeah, this one is so bad, I don’t know what I was thinking that day?” Or “Please just skip this one?” This would be one of those strips in the treasury.

Yes we do! ;o)

Just quietly hand over your picanic basket and everything will be fine.

There was bearly a pun today.

No. It’s simple. Just tell the bear some really devastating news then they’ll get very upset and stop. See how easy it is? It’s shaken bear and ah helped.

Oy! PIG! Oink as loud as you can to scare the bear off…..RAT doesn’t even know!

I believe running downhill is okay. With all that weight, the bear has to slow down to keep from going head over heels.

You cannot outrun a bear and not panicking might just confuse it enough to leave you alone.

Wasn’t it said,make yourself look as big as possible,and make loud noise? Has anyone ever lived to tell?

Bear identification: Climb a tree – if it follows you up the tree, it is a black bear; if it grabs the tree and shakes it until you fall out, it is a grizzly.

True story: my great grandmother came to Canada with her family around 1880 and they were granted acreage in an as-yet unsettled tract of forest at the north end of the Bruce Peninsula. One spring morning she and her younger sister were picking berries when she heard snuffling from the other side of the bush. It was a bear, of course, and the sister was terrified but my great-grandmother decided there were plenty of berries for them all and kept on picking.

At least that’s what she told her daughter-in-law decades later and that’s what my grandmother told me long ago.

What if he comes at you with a pointed stick?

How to stop a bear from charging?

Easy. Take away his MasterCard.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha …

Sorry.

Have some respect. Smokey the bear died in 1976. I remember it well - the window of my new office gave me a fine view of Jeffry Dahmer’s apartment. Like a dope I transferred to a new location just when it was becoming safe for our noontime walks.

I had an encounter with an American Black Bear on a two-week hike of the Appalachian Trail as a Boy Scout back in the 1960’s. I was washing up some mess gear at a spring. Apparently, one of our Troop had thrown some leftovers into the brush. I was scrubbing out a pot, heard a rustling, looked up, and found myself not six feet from a bear enjoying the inadvertent hand-out. I froze. The bear finished his snack, gave me a rather wry look, and just ambled away. All I can say is that my momma’s injunction to always wear clean underwear proved to be useless advice.

Thanks all. Now I know after all these years why my best friend insisted on wearing track shoes when we hiked in the woods.

Outdoor Ollie, take Rat with you the next time you go to the woods, and leave him there!

It’s okay to run as long as you’re faster than your companion.

I met my bear in the middle of a portage trail on the Bowron Lakes. Since I was wearing a canoe on my head I decided against running. I lay down and hid under the canoe till the bear wandered off back to the trailhead to help himself to our supplies…

But you can yell to whoever you’re with “Run!”Maybe that’s why I don’t have any friends (left).

Outdoor Ollie seems a little slow, ether for running away from bears or for answering smart-alecky Rat. At least Pig has a compassionate attitude. (Hey, bears gotta eat, too!)

I can just picture a similar scene with Ollie, the quick-talking news reporter from “Family Guy”, and the main anchor Tom Tucker …

Tom: “Ollie, if you see a bear in the woods, what should you do?”

Ollie: “Stay put!”

Tom: “Thanks, Ollie.”

You also shouldn’t play dead. Bears eat carrion. You might as well stick a garnish on yourself and lie on a plate.